Allan Moss, chief executive of Macquarie Bank, has hit out at critics who claim that the dozens of infrastructure funds it manages and which own community assets from water companies and tolls roads are at risk because they are excessively leveraged.

“That comment about leverage is not a comment that has been made by any of the serious analysts or any of the leading investors,” Mr Moss said in a video interview with the FT. “In fact, the average leverage in our infrastructure funds is less than 60 per cent, which is reasonably conservative for very high quality assets and these are very high quality assets with very, very reliable income streams.”